The TARDIS is drawn to Earth during the Luddite Uprisings. There, the
Master is once again trying to alter the planet's history, while an evil
Time Lady called the Rani is also present, extracting chemicals from the
brains of local workers for her own use. As a result of the Rani's
experiments, rioting amongst the workers is intensifying, threatening
the work of famed engineer George Stephenson. It falls to the Doctor and
Peri to foil the uneasy partnership between the two villains and restore
Earth's history to its proper course.

Production

The Master was dead, to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about
that. Actor Anthony Ainley's contract had expired with his appearance in
Season Twenty-One's Planet Of Fire, and it
was initially felt within the production office that no renewal would be
sought. This was a position particularly favoured by script editor Eric
Saward, who was not a fan of the character. However, as planning for
Doctor Who's twenty-second season got underway, producer John
Nathan-Turner experienced a change of heart, allegedly because of the
Master's continued popularity amongst fans. Instead, it was decided to
maintain the tradition of recent years by having the Master feature in a
single story.

In the meantime, Nathan-Turner was pursuing the husband-and-wife team of
Pip and Jane Baker to write for Season Twenty-Two. The Bakers were
veteran scripters known for their ability to work quickly and to budget.
In addition to several novels and low-budget movies, they had
contributed episodes of television shows such as Z Cars and
Space: 1999. The Bakers had also collaborated with former
Doctor Who producer Graham Williams on an unmade thriller series
called The Zodiac Factor, and Williams had tried unsuccessfully
to interest them in writing for Doctor Who in the late Seventies.
Nathan-Turner was inspired to approach the Bakers after finding their
script for The Zodiac Factor in the Doctor Who production
office. The Bakers were initially reluctant, but were encouraged by
Saward's suggestion that they might attempt an adventure with an
historical setting.

Pip and Jane Baker were reluctant to write for Doctor Who, but were encouraged by the suggestion
of an historical setting

The Bakers decided to devise a storyline which used the Luddite
uprisings as a backdrop. Inspired by a (possibly mythical)
eighteenth-century figure called Ned Ludd, Luddism was an
anti-industrial movement which began in Nottingham in 1811. For the next
several years, the Luddites engaged in a campaign of increasingly
violent vandalism against mill and factory owners. The movement finally
waned following the creation of new laws which imposed severe
punishment against those engaged in industrial espionage. In contrast,
the Bakers also wanted to include George Stephenson, a British engineer
famed for his pioneering work with steam locomotives and railways.

Mindful of the need to come up with a Master story for Season
Twenty-Two, Saward suggested that the villain should be included in the
Bakers' storyline. They developed the notion of pairing the Master with
an evil Time Lady called the Rani, whose name was taken from a Hindi
word for “queen”. Inspired by a neurochemist friend of theirs
who held a very secular view of life, the Bakers envisaged this
character as an amoral scientist for whom the universe was just a giant
laboratory. With their characterisation of the Rani in mind, the pair
was also eager to incorporate an element of real science in their
storyline. Drawing upon an article concerning sleep receptors they had
read in the New Scientist, the Bakers developed a plot thread
about the Rani's experimentation with the sleep centres of the human
brain.

The Bakers were commissioned to write a storyline called “Too
Clever By Far” on September 30th, 1983. By the time the full
scripts were requested, on November 7th, the title had become
“Enter The Rani”. It was planned that this would be the
fourth story of Season Twenty-Two, to be made as Serial 6X. In March, a
happy error on the part of the BBC schedulers resulted in “Enter
The Rani” being allocated an extra week of location filming.
Nathan-Turner was eager to take advantage of this mistake, even though
it meant dropping one of the serial's two studio blocks, and the Bakers
were asked to amend their scripts appropriately.

The director assigned to Serial 6X was Sarah Hellings, making her only
foray into the world of Doctor Who. Hellings had previously
helmed episodes of Angels and Juliet Bravo, and would
later work on shows such as Howards' Way, Doctor Finlay
and Midsomer Murders. Hellings had also worked on Blue
Peter, and had spent some time at Blists Hill Open Air Museum at
Telford in Shropshire. This was a recreation of a nineteenth-century
village which Hellings felt would be perfect for “Enter The
Rani”. The Bakers, on the other hand, had envisaged the story as
being filmed at an open air museum in South Wales, and had included
elements such as overhead coal tracks and a switching station on the
rails. Unfortunately, these were not extant at Blists Hill, and so
Saward had to amend the action to reflect Hellings' chosen location.

On June 6th, Anthony Ainley was contracted to return as the Master in
“Enter The Rani”. For the title character, Hellings proposed
Kate O'Mara, who had appeared in a number of Hammer Horror films
including The Vampire Lovers, and was also well known for
television series such as The Avengers, The Brothers
(wit Colin Baker) and Triangle. Nathan-Turner, on the other hand,
preferred noted stage actress Sarah Badel (with whom he had worked on
The Pallisers). When Badel turned down the offer, Nathan-Turner
decided to follow Hellings' suggestion, and O'Mara was contracted on
September 4th.

By the time rehearsals for Serial 6X began in October, the story had
gained its final title: The Mark Of The Rani. It was also decided
that, although the adventure would be made as the fourth serial of the
production block, it would be broadcast as the third story of Season
Twenty-Two (ahead of The Two Doctors, which
had preceded it into production).

The two-week location shoot was planned to take place entirely at
Telford, and began on October 22nd with a day at the Granville
Colliery Spoils Heap. The arrival of the TARDIS was filmed there, as
was material involving the drayman in Redfern Vale and the theft of the
TARDIS by Ward and his cronies. The next five days were all spent at
Blists Hill, recording a variety of scenes in Killingworth, Redfern
Vale, and around the pithead. Unfortunately, as this first week at
Telford drew to a close, Nicola Bryant injured her neck while sleeping.
As a result, she would have to wear a brace for the remainder of the
shoot -- except while the cameras were actually rolling -- and was in
some discomfort.

After a day off, the second week of filming on The Mark Of The
Rani began on October 29th, when the Coalport China Works served as
the exterior of Lord Ravensworth's office and George Stephenson's
workshop. It was then planned to return to Blists Hill for three further
days, finishing up the location shoot on November 1st; the outstanding
material largely dealt with sequences in Redfern Vale and Redfern Dell.
However, rain began falling on October 30th, significantly slowing the
team's progress. A contingency day had already been scheduled for
November 2nd to deal with such an eventuality, but the bad weather
scarcely let up, and by week's end, Hellings still had a number of vital
scenes left to film.

Even with a contingency day, bad weather resulted in a
number of vital scenes being left unfilmed

It was agreed that some of this material could be rewritten for the
studio, but many of the scenes had to take place in a woodland
environment. Nathan-Turner successfully lobbied for a remount, but the
money allocated for the purpose would not cover a return to Shropshire.
Fortunately, the Bakers knew of a forest called Park Wood, near their
home in Ruislip, Middlesex, that would match the Blists Hill footage
well enough for Hellings' purposes. Cast and crew spent one day at Park
Wood, completing the necessary material on November 12th.

The lone three-day studio session for The Mark Of The Rani began
on November 18th in BBC Television Centre Studio 1. Time was very tight
because of the unexpected need to tape material held over from the
second week at Blists Hill. The 18th saw scenes recorded in the TARDIS
console room, Ravensworth's office, and the Rani's bathhouse. More
bathhouse sequences were taped the next day, along with those at the
entrance to the disused mine and in the Rani's TARDIS. Unlike the
Master's TARDIS seen in recent years, this was not a redressed version
of the Doctor's console room, but rather an entirely new set, designed
by Paul Trerise around a circular theme. Production on Serial 6X
concluded on November 20th, with recording taking place on a variety of
sets -- including the Rani's TARDIS, the disused mineworks,
Ravensworth's office, and Stephenson's workshop -- along with effects
shots.

Unusually, the original commission for the incidental music for The
Mark Of The Rani did not go to a member of the BBC Radiophonic
Workshop -- as was Nathan-Turner's usual policy -- but rather to an
independent composer named John Lewis. Unfortunately, Lewis fell ill
from AIDS-related complications and died in February 1985. Although he
had composed thirty-two minutes of music for The Mark Of The
Rani, it was decided that his work would not be used; his family was
compensated all the same. Instead, Jonathan Gibbs of the Radiophonic
Workshop was assigned the task of composing a new score for the
serial.

Meanwhile, the Rani had proved to be a very popular character with the
production team. Nathan-Turner, in particular, saw her potential as a
recurring adversary for the Doctor -- one whom he felt would be more
complex and less hackneyed than the Master. Kate O'Mara was quickly
sounded out to gauge her interest in returning to Doctor Who, and
she confirmed that she was open to reprising the character. A
preservation order was given for the Rani's TARDIS console room set, and
discussions began with writer Robert Holmes about adding the character
to his planned Season Twenty-Three story, “Yellow Fever, Or How To
Cure It”...